Determine if a button clicked did not result in a page load?

I am implementing a spinning wheel for my website. I first implemented it by displaying a spinning wheel on beforeunload and hiding on load but the animated gif stops spinning on IE so I am now implementing it when a link or button is clicked. However, the gif never hits onload when a button is clicked just for an alert or anything that doesnt redirect/refresh the page. How can I check if a link/button does not cause a page to reload?